O, Savagery
Without moral compass, shame, parsimony,
In summer we gorge on fruit, abundant and cheap.
At times overripe. They are here. Now.
We don’t care, we are careless.
Rinds tossed over shoulders, off porches,
Into great cracking bonfires around which,
If our bellies were not so swollen,
We would dance, knees to chins, fingers snapping.
Instead we sit back, slumped, juices
Running from our mouths, forging divergent paths
Down around nipples, reservoiring in navels
Momentarily, complacently, dreamily,
Before overflowing, resuming south across
Bare thighs, disappearing into nethers,
A lost world, prehistoric, best forgotten.
We may or may not swallow the seeds, who knows?
Panorama
Such checks on human sight, cheekbones
And eye sockets, the blurry bridge of my nose,
The mossy ledge of my brow, thick locks
And bangs when I had hair. The only thing
Sure now, narrow and underfoot, dogspaws
In the snow, there, to and from the fenced yard
Twice a day, regular, faithful. Though beyond
I hear the bare rumors of holy things,
Bone-memory lingering at the edges.
Let’s see, I know woods fill my right
And noisy wetlands my left, and behind these,
Nearly certain, a railroad curving off
By roar and whistle down to a river
That leads in its amble-meander
To a bay, rounded and ample, space
Enough for all the ships to lay
A-wait in serene-arcs for the wind
To furl and nudge them out to sea.
Surely these pictures neat—illustrations
By Wyeth, full pages, spaced regular—
Fit snug enough. And enough is as good
As a feast. Enough. My circle rounds on me,
Grows tighter each day. Do I dare consider
The years? Light throws up walls like anything.
Travels considered then dismissed,
Adventures recalled but never landed. Still,
I know the horizon, I know it’s there.
BD Feil is a poet whose poems have appeared in Poet Lore, Slice Magazine, New Haven Review, New Plains Review, Connecticut River Review, Broad River Review, Summerset Review, and many other places. BD Feil currently writes from Michigan.
Twyckenham Notes 